


23. Failure

by djchika



Series: In the Waiting [2]
Category: Glee RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-27
Updated: 2013-04-27
Packaged: 2017-12-09 15:47:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/775954
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/djchika/pseuds/djchika
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Darren reflects on the break-up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	23. Failure

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted November 17, 2012
> 
> Part of My Crisscolfer 100 Ficlet (Drabble) Challenge

The day after the fight, Darren had stumbled downstairs to find the apartment quiet in a way it had never been before.

His roommates were aware of the fight, but didn’t know the details. Truthfully, Darren and Mia had broken up and gotten back together more times than any of the could count, but there was something different about this one. Something final.

They didn’t know the details but they knew enough.

Joey had given him a sympathetic look and a one armed hug. It took two days before Darren could even look him in the eye. It was another day or two before Jeff would even acknowledge his presence.

He was friends with them both, but if Joey was Darren’s, then Jeff was definitely Mia’s.

He didn’t blame Jeff for being angry on Mia’s behalf. Darren was an asshole. And this time, it held no amount of affection. He was an asshole in the simplest meaning of the word because he had hurt the girl he loved and he hadn’t even known he had been doing it.

And that was the worst part, wasn't it? Because if he had known, if this one time he had been as self-aware as he prided himself to be, then maybe he wouldn't be in this mess.

Darren combed his fingers through his hair. He stood at the mirror and stared at his reflection. Too many days shooting, too many events and parties made him feel like he rarely saw himself in the mirror anymore. All he saw were different reincarnations of Blaine Anderson and Darren Criss.

There was none of that now. Just him and the mirror and the knowledge that the person he was looking at was someone he wasn’t proud of being.

His eyes landed on a picture of him and Mia tacked to the side of the mirror. It was taken years ago, before Glee, before his life had been turned on its end and everything about him had been exposed to the world.

They were both smiling at the camera, their smiles too big, their eyes happy and carefree. He didn’t remember when they had last taken a picture like that together.

Darren screwed his eyes shut, refusing to look at the picture next to it. He doesn’t have to look at it to know what he would see. A group of people all with bright smiles, and in the middle two boys who were smiling secret smiles at each other.

It was a picture taken after the last night of Glee Live. The cast had holed up in Chris’ hotel room after the party had broken up. They were all bone tired but were on a natural high at the thought of having just finished a world tour.

It was the night of the Dublin Kiss, as people had started calling it now. He knew he had been flirting with Chris, was aware that Ashley had started eyeing him suspiciously, but he didn’t think there was anything wrong with it as long as Chris didn’t mind. He and Mia had broken up a couple of months after he had started work on Glee and he didn’t think there was anything wrong with two single guys flirting.

He never thought that it would be prophetic of something more, of something he wouldn’t see coming. Didn’t think it would take his girlfriend to make him see what an asshole he turned out to be.

Mia hadn’t minded at first. She loved the cast as much as he did, had fallen into their circle as easily as most of his friends. It wasn’t until she had moved to LA that things had changed.

They had fought. Loudly and repeatedly. The last fight happened right after a party with too many drinks and too many people. It wasn’t the first time that they had touched on the subject, but it was the first time that Mia had blatantly called him out on it.

It was a challenge and an accusation and Darren wished with all his heart that he could deny it, but the truth was Chris had crept up on him. Saturated his life to the point that he didn't realize his due north had shifted from New York to right there in LA.

He didn’t answer her question then. He had taken the coward’s way and had walked out. Had declared them to be too drunk for the conversation when both of them had sobered up hours ago.

It took a week before he finally, finally accepted it. A week before he was brave enough to acknowledge the truth of her words. Darren had shown up at Mia’s doorstep that night and the look on his face was all the confirmation she needed.

They cried and Darren apologized over and over again. Simple statements of “I’m sorry,” with none of the swear words that usually colored his language. None of the deeply profound thoughts that usually accompanied his heart felt speeches.

There were no words for this. Not when he felt like his entire world had shifted and a chasm had exposed itself, too wide and too deep and yet, he had no choice but to jump in with nothing but his too big heart. His heart that had started loving a boy with a heart as big as his own.

He opened his eyes and stared at his reflection, forcing thoughts of Chris out of his head. It wasn’t fair to be thinking of Chris at that moment. It wasn’t fair to Mia. It wasn’t fair to Chris. It was too soon. Not only because he and Mia had just broken up, but because his world was fragile and too prone to having people come in and twist things around and turn them into something ugly and malicious.

He wondered how he managed to fuck up so badly that he was in danger of losing two of the most important people in his life. 

The pain gathered in Darren's chest until he felt like was choking on it.

He hated it. Hated that he was hurting Mia. Hated that whatever he was feeling for Chris was now tainted and complicated. But then again, when was it ever going to be simple for the two of them?

For a moment he allowed himself to think of Chris and the fear that beat in his heart was loud in his ears. Fear and anticipation and love that burned  so brightly and acutely.

Someday the pain of the past would ebb away and there would be time for whispered confessions and he’d finally let himself say the words buried deep in his heart. Someday there would be a time for love, but right now, now was a time for healing.


End file.
